Defining Teacher Quality in India

Using administrative data from linked private schools from one of districts in India that matches 8,319 pupils to their subject-specific teachers at the senior secondary level, the project estimates the importance of individual teachers on student outcomes in the high-stake senior secondary exam (at the end of twelfth grade). The project finds a considerable variability in teacher effectiveness over a two year course—a one standard deviation improvement in teacher quality adds 0.38 standard deviation points in students score. Furthermore, consistent with studies in the US, this study finds that although teacher quality matters, the observed characteristics explain little of the variability in teacher quality.

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